Honestly, i am alittle concerned with this heavy focus on emotions in sims 4. If they can strike the right balance it could be a nice added feature, but if it's overkill it could be a major turn off as well. I was looking at one of the videos that provided a walk through of some of the features regarding emotions and my first impression was...is this gonna turn into a sim psychology game full of endless and uncontrollable drama?

First not sure i want that pop up in the corner of my screen telling me my sim is feeling this or that..seems intrusive to the screen and really don't want it nagging at me in that way. I was immediately annoyed and turned off with the guy whining over the violin music and then the other guy sitting in the chair pouting because he was bored... then he threw a temper tamper.. then he was upset because of jealousy....i can see where stuff like that is gonna get real old real fast and potentially turn everything into constant endless drama. I worry S4 is gonna feel more like a never ending replay of the terrible 2's or teen years with my sims after a week or so? I already have two teenagers, three dogs, a bird and a grown daughter with a new born pulling her hair out as a first time mom calling me every hour.....yeah i have enough drama already in my life and the last thing i need is my sims to become overly emotional drama queens in overkill.

Either way it just feels like the game is potentially dictating my sims reactions and emotions a bit too much as well...but just the overkill of emotions alone that i saw makes me concerned that maybe the game play is focusing more on micromanaging their emotions on a whole new excessive level...one that i would find annoying and frustrating. I am keeping a open mind with a wait and see attitude, just hoping this isn't the case though. It certainly would be a deal breaker for me sadly.

I am confident that the Maxis Sims Team is working hard to refine TS4’s Emotions feature.

However, I do NOT like the game telling me via huge-font-all-capitals EMO-WORDS displayed on the screen how the sims are feeling. I find the Emo-Words intrusive and obtrusive!

I do like the transitory symbols – the different angry clouds relating the sims’ angry emotions shown on the video – above the sims’ avatars. I prefer to have the transitory emotion-symbols instead; such as: rainbows, butterflies, stars, hearts, ...

I also would like it much better for the game to SHOW ME show me show me how the sims are feeling through the sims’ emoting-animations, their interactions with each other and their surroundings, their speech bubbles, the tone of their simlish speech, the activities prior and during what is happening, their plumbob color, their avatar’s background color along with their traits, memories/previous history, etc … Those should be enough for me to translate or mistranslate - whether in purpose - their emotions.

Gramz777 wrote:Honestly, i am alittle concerned with this heavy focus on emotions in sims 4. If they can strike the right balance it could be a nice added feature, but if it's overkill it could be a major turn off as well. I was looking at one of the videos that provided a walk through of some of the features regarding emotions and my first impression was...is this gonna turn into a sim psychology game full of endless and uncontrollable drama?

First not sure i want that pop up in the corner of my screen telling me my sim is feeling this or that..seems intrusive to the screen and really don't want it nagging at me in that way. I was immediately annoyed and turned off with the guy whining over the violin music and then the other guy sitting in the chair pouting because he was bored... then he threw a temper tamper.. then he was upset because of jealousy....i can see where stuff like that is gonna get real old real fast and potentially turn everything into constant endless drama. I worry S4 is gonna feel more like a never ending replay of the terrible 2's or teen years with my sims after a week or so? I already have two teenagers, three dogs, a bird and a grown daughter with a new born pulling her hair out as a first time mom calling me every hour.....yeah i have enough drama already in my life and the last thing i need is my sims to become overly emotional drama queens in overkill.

Either way it just feels like the game is potentially dictating my sims reactions and emotions a bit too much as well...but just the overkill of emotions alone that i saw makes me concerned that maybe the game play is focusing more on micromanaging their emotions on a whole new excessive level...one that i would find annoying and frustrating. I am keeping a open mind with a wait and see attitude, just hoping this isn't the case though. It certainly would be a deal breaker for me sadly.

Just to point out the demo video isn't exactly how the game is going to work with emotions. Sims aren't going to immediately become sad just from hearing a violin and then instantly turn angry because of a painting, etc, etc.

Every time A sim comes in contact with a stimulus that would cause a certain emotion it stacks. For example he looks at a sad painting, then faces a sad situation such as a girlfriend breaking up with him, then hears the sad violin.

These stimuli's stack to cause an emotion and the sim won't actually become sad until the stimuli build up enough. You know kind of like real life emotions. Facing one sad situation isn't usually going to make you horribly sad. But if you face multiple situations in a row they build up to create more of an emotional reaction.

So the game isn't going to just constantly jump between emotions.

Also each emotion in the game has levels. Sims aren't going to just automatically burst into this massive flood of tears because they are slightly sad. The levels of the emotion have to build up.

For example

In the diagram below the dashes would represent stimuli (I don't know the actual amount of stimuli that will be required to raise the emotions level but it would make sense that it will be at least 4-5)

-
-
-
-
-
angry
-
-
-
-
-
enraged
-
-
-
-
-
furious

So basically you don't just hit a stimuli and your sim is just raging about. The emotion builds up gradually to simple anger. If your sim keeps building up that emotion they will become enraged, if they keep building up from there they can become furious.

And just because a sim has the emotion doesn't mean they will just non stop rage around. Most of the time the sim is going to act mostly normal except for the fact that what emotion they have will reveal or hide certain interactions (a furious sim obviously is not going to be flirting) and certain animations will be slightly different such as the walk.

taciturnsim wrote:I, too, made a thread about the Emo-Words – I do NOT like them.

I am confident that the Maxis Sims Team is working hard to refine TS4’s Emotions feature.

However, I do NOT like the game telling me via huge-font-all-capitals EMO-WORDS displayed on the screen how the sims are feeling. I find the Emo-Words intrusive and obtrusive!

I do like the transitory symbols – the different angry clouds relating the sims’ angry emotions shown on the video – above the sims’ avatars. I prefer to have the transitory emotion-symbols instead; such as: rainbows, butterflies, stars, hearts, ...

I also would like it much better for the game to SHOW ME show me show me how the sims are feeling through the sims’ emoting-animations, their interactions with each other and their surroundings, their speech bubbles, the tone of their simlish speech, the activities prior and during what is happening, their plumbob color, their avatar’s background color along with their traits, memories/previous history, etc … Those should be enough for me to translate or mistranslate - whether in purpose - their emotions.

There is also a poll about this; I will bump it.

The game will show you the sims emotions through animations, as has been shown through various footage. But you also have to realize that a lot of the time playing the sims is often done with the camera pulled back to view most of the household rather than close up on one sim. So thos animations aren't necessarily going to stand out. Thats why they have a part of the UI dedicated to helping players see their sims emotion without them having to zoom all the way in and wait for an idle. I do think it would be nice if it was a bit smaller but its a useful tool to help keep track of multiple sims emotions without having to zoom all the way in on each sim in turn and wait for an animation.

Things like changing the plumbob color wouldn't work for emotions since it's already used to represent need levels.

Plus you shouldn't have to translate the emotions. If your mad you don't have to look at a bunch of factors around you to know your mad, you just know. So since you are your sims the game lets you automatically know what emotion they are feeling just like you would naturally know in real life.

taciturnsim wrote:I, too, made a thread about the Emo-Words – I do NOT like them.

I am confident that the Maxis Sims Team is working hard to refine TS4’s Emotions feature.

However, I do NOT like the game telling me via huge-font-all-capitals EMO-WORDS displayed on the screen how the sims are feeling. I find the Emo-Words intrusive and obtrusive!

I do like the transitory symbols – the different angry clouds relating the sims’ angry emotions shown on the video – above the sims’ avatars. I prefer to have the transitory emotion-symbols instead; such as: rainbows, butterflies, stars, hearts, ...

I also would like it much better for the game to SHOW ME show me show me how the sims are feeling through the sims’ emoting-animations, their interactions with each other and their surroundings, their speech bubbles, the tone of their simlish speech, the activities prior and during what is happening, their plumbob color, their avatar’s background color along with their traits, memories/previous history, etc … Those should be enough for me to translate or mistranslate - whether in purpose - their emotions.

There is also a poll about this; I will bump it.

Thank you taciturnsim i will go check it out...agree much more prefer that method as well

Gramz777 wrote:Honestly, i am alittle concerned with this heavy focus on emotions in sims 4. If they can strike the right balance it could be a nice added feature, but if it's overkill it could be a major turn off as well. I was looking at one of the videos that provided a walk through of some of the features regarding emotions and my first impression was...is this gonna turn into a sim psychology game full of endless and uncontrollable drama?

First not sure i want that pop up in the corner of my screen telling me my sim is feeling this or that..seems intrusive to the screen and really don't want it nagging at me in that way. I was immediately annoyed and turned off with the guy whining over the violin music and then the other guy sitting in the chair pouting because he was bored... then he threw a temper tamper.. then he was upset because of jealousy....i can see where stuff like that is gonna get real old real fast and potentially turn everything into constant endless drama. I worry S4 is gonna feel more like a never ending replay of the terrible 2's or teen years with my sims after a week or so? I already have two teenagers, three dogs, a bird and a grown daughter with a new born pulling her hair out as a first time mom calling me every hour.....yeah i have enough drama already in my life and the last thing i need is my sims to become overly emotional drama queens in overkill.

Either way it just feels like the game is potentially dictating my sims reactions and emotions a bit too much as well...but just the overkill of emotions alone that i saw makes me concerned that maybe the game play is focusing more on micromanaging their emotions on a whole new excessive level...one that i would find annoying and frustrating. I am keeping a open mind with a wait and see attitude, just hoping this isn't the case though. It certainly would be a deal breaker for me sadly.

Just to point out the demo video isn't exactly how the game is going to work with emotions. Sims aren't going to immediately become sad just from hearing a violin and then instantly turn angry because of a painting, etc, etc.

Every time A sim comes in contact with a stimulus that would cause a certain emotion it stacks. For example he looks at a sad painting, then faces a sad situation such as a girlfriend breaking up with him, then hears the sad violin.

These stimuli's stack to cause an emotion and the sim won't actually become sad until the stimuli build up enough. You know kind of like real life emotions. Facing one sad situation isn't usually going to make you horribly sad. But if you face multiple situations in a row they build up to create more of an emotional reaction.

So the game isn't going to just constantly jump between emotions.

Also each emotion in the game has levels. Sims aren't going to just automatically burst into this massive flood of tears because they are slightly sad. The levels of the emotion have to build up.

For example

In the diagram below the dashes would represent stimuli (I don't know the actual amount of stimuli that will be required to raise the emotions level but it would make sense that it will be at least 4-5)

-
-
-
-
-
angry
-
-
-
-
-
enraged
-
-
-
-
-
furious

So basically you don't just hit a stimuli and your sim is just raging about. The emotion builds up gradually to simple anger. If your sim keeps building up that emotion they will become enraged, if they keep building up from there they can become furious.

And just because a sim has the emotion doesn't mean they will just non stop rage around. Most of the time the sim is going to act mostly normal except for the fact that what emotion they have will reveal or hide certain interactions (a furious sim obviously is not going to be flirting) and certain animations will be slightly different such as the walk.

Thank you Celiria for your response and clarifying things. I certainly wanted my sims to have more emotion and what you said sounds right on with what i would like to see ...... big sigh of relief

Celiria wrote:....a lot of the time playing the sims is often done with the camera pulled back to view most of the household....

Not me; I play zoomed in on certain sims with the camera locked onto him/her; wherever he/she goes, the camera goes. This is where playing 1st person would be awesome: to see what the sim(s) see. Yeah, I know that EA will never have 1st person as an option, but I can dream, right?

I'm pretty sure what we saw wasn't the finished user interface, so I'm sure that thing in the corner will be modified. I doubt we'll have something that large in the corner. I thought I heard they wanted to change up the UI, but if they return to the same ones we've had in previous sims games there will probably be a symbol somewhere showing their emotion.

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